Following the evolution of The Bushwick Collective and its annual block party in Brooklyn has been a captivating journey akin to an anthropological exploration into the growing embrace of street art and murals within the realms of graffiti and HipHop. Back in the day, as the neighborhood began transforming with the influx of gentrifiers, street art faced outright dismissal or was treated as a rare phenomenon, a curiosity.
Unaware of the previous codes that roughly governed the practices of graffiti writers on the street, art-students-cum-street-art-poets often obtusely stomped their way into public view to circumvent a gallery system and to express their right to self-expression in public; something HipHop culture had been encouraging for years but had perhaps not envisioned this way. The rivalry between graffiti aficionados and street artists/muralists was sometimes palpable, with throwies vandalizing fresh paint, the OGs asserting territorial dominance, and at times, even resorting to threats and insults in person and in online forums.
As the block party, now in its twelfth year, unfolded, its early editions predominantly featured international and some local street artists eagerly seeking out BC’s visionary leader, Joe Ficalora, for an opportunity to leave their mark on his neighborhood walls. Local street art forums found fault with Ficalora, masking a barely hidden contempt for a streetwise guy taking a leadership role and betraying their own classist privileged opinions about the right to curation. That has all melted appreciably; this year’s event evidenced the remarkable shift that has been underway. Graffiti writers took the stage alongside the muralists in prime spots, sometimes seamlessly collaborating to create art transcending boundaries, all while the electrifying sounds of live HipHop performances reverberated through the air and TikTokers danced in front of them.
Let’s raise a bottle to those who always believed in the possibility of this transformative phenomenon, and to those who championed inclusivity over exclusivity. It’s yet another reason why our hearts beat for this extraordinary international art movement, the embodiment of the people’s democratic spirit and the unlimited creative spirit that is in every person. And most importantly, it’s a reminder of why we hold you dear.
The Bushwick Collective’s Block Party 12th edition ended with a bang and big crowds. This year Joe Ficalora, the founder, organizer, and curator, threw a warehouse party as part of the festivities and included a full-size replica of a New York Subway train designed by Danny Cortes and tagged by dozens of graffiti writers from the Metropolitan Area. We gave you a sneak peek of the train last week HERE. Today we bring you complete documentation with details shots of the train. BSA spoke about the project with Mr. Cortes, Edward Rivera, Mike See, and Joe Ficalora.
“So it’s amazing to me that you have taken something massive like a 1980s subway car, shrunk it down at one point to a highly detailed miniature…. and now you’re blowing it back up again!” says a BSA interviewer.
“It feels amazing, to tell the truth,” says artist Danny Cortes while a small team of fabricators and painters working feverishly on the full-scale car for an installation at the Bushwick Collective Block Party.
“Which one’s harder to do? The full-sized version or the smaller one?”
“The miniature,” Danny says with no hesitation. “Because the intricate details are so tiny and difficult to mimic something, you know? But it’s all; it’s so much fun. It’s so much fun.”
Cortes has been having a lot of big success in recent years making his painstaking replicas of New York scenes that make you feel warm and nostalgic for the streets; bodega storefronts, ice storage machines slaughtered with tags, box trucks, blue US mailboxes covered with stickers, the front of CBGB’s club, ice cream trucks, even tiny video VHS tapes of classics like “Wild Style.” And like the best writers in the day, he has been blowing up – scoring exhibitions and sometimes a celebrity client.
“I can show you what I’m working on,” he says, “I can show you, uh, one that I got for Drake for July” he reaches in his pocket to pull out his phone to show you his replica of a subway train pulling in under the tiled sign that says “Atlantic Avenue”. “So Barclays Center commissioned me to make this for Drake for his tour that’s coming in July. I’ll show you on Instagram. So it has almost the same concept.”
Mike See, who has been working long hours for days with Edward Rivera (aka Shutter Ed) and a team of people to fabricate this train, doesn’t even seem fatigued. When he talks about the sophisticated techniques of creating the lights, the windows, the seats, the finishes, and even the strap hangers – you can tell he’s excited to be a part of a crew. He may be more excited to have seen some graff heads who stopped by to tag the train in progress.
“A bunch of legendary graffiti artists came through – they cleared the warehouse for certain people to come in and be secretive. They did what they do, and there are layers of graffiti history from New York City graffiti right here. Is amazing. Outsides, insides, .. it makes you imagine the movie ‘The Warriors.’”
“Legends in the game,” says Cortes of some of the tags they have collected on this tribute train. “These are names that have been doing it for years and used to hit this same style of train for years. So this makes it more authentic. Not only is it like a stamp for me, but it’s also, it’s important to bring realism,” he says as he describes the process of layering, distressing, and applying finishes to the original pieces and tags to make them appear as authentic as possible.
“That’s why I faded out sometimes, right? You know, just to give it that overlay look and the fade distress, the stress look. That’s my style. The gritty, dirty, rusty. Yeah. What’s an eyesore to somebody else’s eye? It’s beauty to me, okay. So I accomplished that on this piece right here with my team.”
This replica of a subway car has been tagged for this special project by GIZ, SAINT, GHOST, THEAM, IR, CES, SPOT, JAKEE, KED, PGISM, ACNE, BERT, AND LANDO, DANNY CORTES, NEP, NOE, CHEO MSG, AND MIKE SEE among other graffiti writers.
The Bushwick Collective Annual Summer Block Party, now on its 12th edition, has established itself as an official opener of the Summer season in New York City. With its combination of art, music, and food, this is at its root a street art initiative founded and provided by local resident and business owner Joe Ficalora. Joe continues to show his steadfast dedication to the community with a significant, free open event for everybody in the family to enjoy.
Artists from around the world and local artists are invited to create vibrant and large-scale murals that encompass all disciplines, including graffiti in a very big way, on the walls of buildings in Bushwick. Making public space safer for the public to enjoy, many streets are closed off, allowing attendees to roam freely and explore the various murals, including many that are being created by the artists as passersby watch. Live music performances by local performers and DJs add to the festive atmosphere, with food trucks, vendors, and art installations – a true community event for people of all backgrounds.
Here are some of the new murals and installations underway. We’ll bring you a recap of the newly finished pieces soon. Enjoy!
Joe Ficalora, the Bushwick Collective founder and curator, invited us to stop by the warehouse where tonight’s Warehouse Party will be held and offered us an exclusive peek at the Subway Art Installation that Artist Danny Cortes, and his team – headed by Mike See and Edward Rivera have been working on. This replica of a subway car has been tagged for this special project by GIZ, SAINT, GHOST, THEAM, IR, CES, SPOT, JAKEE, KED, PGISM, ACNE, BERT, AND LANDO, DANNY CORTES, NEP, NOE, CHEO MSG, AND MIKE SEE among other graffiti writers.
“So, the concept behind Danny’s miniatures fascinates me,” he explains amidst the swirling cloud of sawdust, the cacophony of drills, and the booming voices. “They are incredibly small, which presents a unique opportunity for an exclusive experience, allowing you to truly step ‘inside’ his miniature world.” BSA (Brooklyn Street Art) was fortunate enough to be invited for their own exclusive experience. Here we give you a chance to catch a preview glimpse of the train-in-the-making, set to be unveiled tonight at the grand opening of Ficalora’s annual celebration of street culture, urban art, graffiti, Hip Hop, and sidewalk selfies.
As always, this year’s Bushwick Collective block party sparks numerous collaborations. “The synergies within our circle are remarkable,” Joe affirms. “We rely solely on our resources to create exactly what we need; you know what I mean?”
The level of detail on this train is astonishing. It showcases layers of tags and pieces on the exterior, some acid washed and weathered, while others shimmer with a silver tint. Inside, vibrant tags of New York graffiti heroes from the movement hustle for space, accompanied by door panel pieces, vintage advertising, faded throwies, curved orange seating, and even meticulously crafted 3-D printed straphangers that match the originals in size and shape.
Miniatures of New York scenes are brought to life regularly by Bushwick’s very own Danny Cortes, who faithfully recreates architectural and street-inspired works brimming with nostalgia and imbued with character. In a stroke of curatorial wizardry, Joe Ficalora, the founder of the Bushwick Collective, has decided to commission two enlarged versions of these miniatures, playfully warping perception and conjuring your own memories of New York and its streets.
Over the course of a dozen years, the initiative of bringing hundreds of artists to paint in this Brooklyn neighborhood has undeniably transformed not only the physical landscape but also the scene and spirit of the area. It has become a more welcoming and inclusive environment than one might expect. You will witness fresh combinations, collaborations, and occasional superstar appearances here. However, the essence of the “collective” still remains at the core.
Another one of Joe’s curatorial endeavors for 2023 includes enlarging one of Cortes’ miniature sculptures—an iconic bodega scene—which the artist himself was working on yesterday from a lift. “Zach Curtis from Michigan is also here, and we decided to collaborate once again, this time transforming his miniature model of street life into a mural. The concepts behind the two pieces- the train and the bodega – beautifully align.”
More on this captivating project will be shared here later. Make sure not to miss the grand arrival of the train, scheduled for tonight and set to be showcased throughout the weekend here in Bushwick, Brooklyn.
BSA has been promoting and supporting The Bushwick Collective and the artists who paint there from the very beginning.
Before The New York Times. Before Time Out. Before The Daily News and many other news or culture outlets. Before there were any videos of Joe Ficalora telling his story. Before Social Media turned every private act into an object for mass consumption. Before the street art tours. Before Street Art was a cottage industry in our borough.
As we celebrate five years of Bushwick Collective we have a question for you: Do you remember it’s original name before he changed it to Bushwick Collective? Joe contacted us out of the blue one day to ask us to curate some walls with him and to help him contact some artists and we immediately sensed a determination in Mr. Ficalora that was stellar. However, we never could have envisioned the huge daily festival it has become or how many people would celebrate or malign it.
Bushwick Open Studios was already in full effect by that time – another artists’ effort we were among the first to support – and Manhattan art fans were beginning to make the trek a little further out on the L train to Bushwick now that Williamsburg had been clobbered by consumers by the late 2000s.
The first Bushwick Collective party had a DJ and 10 muralists. Jim Avignon, KLUB 7, and Gabriel Spector among them. Unofficially included was the huge “return” of COST, who slammed an entire defunct garage shop with posters and paint – a site that he often returned to in the months that followed to revise and expand.
It’s been a rollicking and sometimes rocky ride with the Collective, with mostly the voices of fans and few detractors, including silly art-school gentrifiers who bemoaned the gentrification that these murals brought to the neighborhood. Also local graff writers felt disrespected or overlooked by what they perceived as an invasion, and you can’t blame them for feeling that way.
Mostly, it has been a celebration of the creative spirit in these twenty-teens in Brooklyn and we all know that this too is a temporary era, as New York is continually reinventing itself. Enjoy these murals smacked cheek-by-jowl for block after block by an international train of talents running through Bushwick today, because they are here for you to enjoy in this moment. Like David Bowie wisely told us, “These are the golden years.”
It’s Bushwick Collective Weekend Yo! The assembled faces and artists is local, national, international – a melange of what Brooklyn has become in recent years and the streets are alive with involved citizenry in search of entertainment, art and community. The Street Art scene is alive and well, just mutating weirdly as it always does; charges of commercialism and the whitening power of gentrification notwithstanding. A little further out in BedStuy was the #PrincePartyBK yesterday with Spike Lee celebrating the Purple One’s birthday, along with a lot of Biggie love, and Muhammad Ali love, and you, Love.
Here’s our weekly interview with the street, this week featuring 1Penemy, BG183, Bio, City Kitty, Coro, Crash, GIZ, JMR, KLOPS, Loco Art, Marie Roberts, Nepo, Nicer, Samantha Vernon, Sheryo, Tats Crew, The Yok, Thomas Allen, Tristan Eaton, UNO, XSM, and You Go Girl!
Our weekly focus on the moving image and art in the streets. And other oddities.
Now screening :
1. Born and Bred: The Rise of Street Art in Bushwick 2. Collettivo FX and Their Enormous Wall in Castellarano
3. Lek and Sowat Make an Art Print
4. TELLAS at Altrove, courtesy @BlindeyeFactory
5. Sh*t Brooklyn People Say
BONUS: FAT JOE Performing Live at Bushwick Collective Block Party 2015 Last Weekend
BSA Special Feature: Born and Bred: The Rise of Street Art in Bushwick
It’s all about Joe! While you were looking for a brunch spot or a beard wax or simply at your navel, Joe took an opportunity to connect artists with walls and did more for the “scene” in Bushwick than an L Train full of pilgrims ever could. He cleared the way for a slew of local and international artists and writers looking for an opportunity to exercise their creative speech and courted the press with his local native personal story so often that you can imagine a Netflix series will be next.
In our mind, Joe is just a true cultural worker who probably saved many peeps from taking themselves too seriously. There was, no doubt, plenty of Street Art and graff in the neighborhood for years before he started getting walls for artists but this guy more-or-less opened the flood gates that answered a need many had for a welcoming public space to see and discuss art.
There is no actual “collective” unless you think of the collective audience of old-timers, new kids, and tourists who have been able to participate and contemplate and consider the creative spirit that is alive in each of us and on display here in many different iterations. That is who is called the collective WE.
Collettivo FX and Their Enormous Wall in Castellarano
This is an actual collective called Collettivo FX (Marco AvantGarde Cavazzoni and Emilio Campana) who slaughtered a wall with animals in the municipality of Castellarano, a town of 13,000 in Northern Italy. The drone cam shots and the sound track by Brian Eno are masterful and mature, adding to the scope of the collective’s undertaking.
Lek and Sowat Show How to Make a Print
Lithography enhanced by hand, this is a mixture of 19th century know-how and contemporary art. If you want to know how an art print is made, now you know.
Okay before you get your attitude all snarly, this is just one slice of Brooklyn. Brooklyn has something like a hundred languages being spoken on the streets and in the stores and hair salons and funeral parlors and restaurants and 54% don’t even speak English at home. That’s a fact. But this is still funny. One slice. You gotta better video? Send it to us!
BONUS: FAT JOE Performing Live at Bushwick Collective Block Party 2015 Last Weekend
Shot on the street by Christopher Smith. Lean Back!
BROOKLYN STREET ART LOVES YOU MORE EVERY DAY
